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Fuel Duty Rebate wasreplaced by Bus Service Operators Grant with effect from 1 July 2002. Theinformation sought is as follows.

Financial Year	Expenditure on Bus Fuel Duty (£ million)	Expenditure on Bus Service Operators Grant (£ million)
1997-98	32.130	-
1998-99	37.867	-
1999-2000	45.196	-
2000-01	49.262	-
2001-02	49.641	-
2002-03	12.830	36.810

For Bus Fuel Duty, replacedfrom 1 July 2002 by Bus Service Operators Grant, the rate of rebate paid onultra low sulphur diesel, the fuel predominantly used by bus operators, havebeen as follows:

Effective Date	Rebate (pence per litre)
1997	25.14
18 March 1998	29.85
10 March 1999	35.07
22 March 2000	36.68
1 October 2003	37.96

MTV Networks Europe wasresponsible for marketing the MTV Europe Music Awards. No additional fundingwas provided for this purpose.

The Scottish Executive is in regular contact with the UK Government on a wide range of issues,including non-domestic rates. Scottish assessors are also in regular contactwith their counterparts in England and Wales, the Valuation Office Agency, to ensure the systemis consistent north and south of the border.

Thefollowing is a summary of the total rateable value for the major operators (whichis split into local valuation rolls) rounded to nearest £50,000:

Operator
BT	£45.5 million
Cable and Wireless (Mercury)	£3.15 million
THUS	£2.7 million
Telewest (includes cable TV)	£4.3 million
NTL (includes cable TV)	£2.5 million

Therelevant assessor is also in contact with:

Easynet

Energis

Global Crossing

Zipcom plc

Your Communications

MCI Worldcom

SSE Telecommunications

 

With a view to identifyingthe extent of their Scottish networks and agreeing appropriate rateable values.

Information on rateablevalues in England is a matter for the Valuation Office Agency. Theinformation is not held centrally by the Scottish Executive.

Rateable values fortelecommunications operators are based on the rateable assets in occupation bythem. Any variations will be determined by the extent of such assets in theoccupation of any particular operator. The majority of operators are valuedusing the comparative approach where actual rental levels of fibre space areused to set the rateable value. For BT the receipts and expenditure method isused to value their rateable assets due to the size of the network. If thismethod was used for the smaller operators it would result in a nil or very low rateablevalue. There is relevant legislation and case law which sets out when it isappropriate to use the receipts and expenditure method and assessors, who areindependent from both central and local government, follow this whendetermining how to reach a rateable value. The valuation of the industry isbeing looked at afresh in advance of revaluation 2005 and assessors will beholding discussions with all operators to agree an approach and ensure thesystem is fair to all.

Yes. The basic principle ofrating is that any subject is valued for occupation by a hypothetical tenantnot the actual occupier.

All telecommunicationsoperators in rateable occupation of fibre are currently in the valuation rollor are in the process of providing the necessary information to the relevantassessor to allow entries to be made.

I have asked Angiolina Foster, Acting Chief Executive of Communities Scotland, to respond. Herresponse is as follows.

Issues of SIP governance area matter for local decision and as such the Executive has made no prescriptionon how such matters should operate. However, the robust monitoring frameworkwhich we have in place for SIPs allows for local issues to be brought to theattention of Communities Scotland.

This is an operationalmatter for VisitScotland. However, VisitScotland has an overriding strategy toincrease the volume and value of visitors from international markets.VisitScotland will continue to work using its thematic brand campaigns in keyinternational markets to ensure the best possible return on investment.